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PAGAN SONNETS 



PAGAN SONNETS 



BY 



JOHN MYERS O'HARA 



PORTLAND MAINE 

SMITH & SALE 

MDCCCCXIII 



TS3 



rs-'t 



Vl^'^^ 



COPYRIGHT, 1913, BY SMITH & SALE 



Of this edition two himdred copies 
have been printed. 

No. ^^ 






V 



t 



V 



:> TO 



Nj 



JOHN LEWIS HERVEY 

A l^h, passes. Art alone 
Enduring stays to us ; 
The bust outlives the throne, 
The coin, Tiberius. 

'•'Even the gods must go ; 

Only the lofty rhyme 
Not cotmtless years overthrow 

Nor long array of time'' 



[thanks are due for permission to reprint 

CERTAIN SONNETS IN THIS VOLUME TO The 

Bookman, Metropolitan Magazine, Munsefs 
Magazine, and Smart Set?^ 



JE suis un hofnme des temps Homeriques ; 
le monde ou je vis nest pas le mien^ et 
je ne comprends rieji la societe qui mentoure. 
Le Christ nest pas ve^iu pour ntoi ; je 
suis aussi pdien qii Alcibiade et Phidias. 
Je nai jamais ete cuiellir sur le Golgotha 
les Jleurs de la passion, et le Jleuve profond 
qui coule du Jianc du crucijie et fait une 
ceinture rouge au monde, ne ma pas baignee 
de ses Jlots ; mon corps rebelle ne veut point 
reconnaitre la suprematie de V ame, et ma 
chair nentend point qu'on la mortifie. Je 
trouve la terre aussi belle que la del, et je ne 
pense que la correction de la forme est la 
vertu. 

— THEOPHILE GAUTIER. 




HAT symbol for the sonnet, vestal Nine f 
Jewel or beaker ? or a fairer still f 
Come, haunters of the Heliconian hill, 
And deign the cincture for this gem of thine I 
Ah, yield the cup the lips of love propine. 
As Hebes goblet of ambrosial thrill ; 
The sonnefs golden beaker poets fill 
JVith fire of soul, a vintage more divine. 
Jewel the heart might hoard I or beaker dipped 
By auric anses to the chrismal mouth I 
Rayed with the North or vintaged with the South, 
A fetter der the soul it might be slipped ; 
Or glow, the brimming chalice fate ordained 

To some great love, that never may be drained. 



CONTENTS 



INSPIRATION 

ART . 

THE HUSHED GODS 

TANAGRA . 

aqu/e religio . 
Vespasian's circus 
an old coin 
the latin sea . 
Hadrian's villa 
heliogabalus . 
caia's star 
^gean idyl 

CORINTH 



PAGE 
I 

2 

3 

4 

5 
6 

7 
8 

9 

10 

II 

12 

13 



Vll 



CONTENTS 



ANADYOMENE 

EUXANTHIS 

ANAKTORIA 

THE FLAMING HEART 

A BURIAL URN . 

THE RACE . 

A GREEK FRIEZE 

MELEAGER . 

A TEAR BOTTLE 

THE FLAGELLANT 

A JEWESS . 

THE MUEZZIN 

THE GHEBER 



A VENETIAN WINE GLASS 



AT RIMINI . 



A SPIDER 



LAFCADIO HEARN 



PAGE 

15 
16 

17 

18 

19 
20 

21 

22 

23 
24 

25 
26 

27 

28 

29 
30 



Vlll 



CONTENTS 



EPHEMERA 

CREPUSCULINE . 

A HAUNTED ROOM 
FAME . 

a soap bubble 
adolescence 
Mendelssohn's spring song 
printemps nocturne 
the twilight pool . 
adagio lamentoso . 

VALOR 

THE PAGAN END 



PAGE 
31 
32 

33 
34 

35 
36 

37 

38 

39 
40 

41 
42 



IX 



PAGAN SONNETS 



THE PUBLISHERS WISH TO ACKNOWLEDGE WITH 
THANKS THE AUTHOR's KINDNESS FOR PERMISSION 
TO USE THE TEXT OF HIS PRIVATELY PRINTED 
EDITION. 




INSPIRATION 

RAW nearer still and wrap me in thy flame ! 
Etherealize my body, lift my soul 
On some wild wind to Song's supernal goal, 
O rapture of the spirit poets claim ! 
Lighten the feet of fancy that are lame; 

Unbind the mortal gyves, for I would snatch 
Talaria no Ankle-Winged could match, 
Filch from the gods their fire and bear the blame. 
And I with pinions emulous of thine, 

Eagle of Jove, that circles the divine, 
Would rise to wider vision, face to face, 
With deity in empyrean space; 
Lift to the stars my prayer for beauty's light, 

Standing in pride on Song's transcendent height. 



ART 

CARVE calm thy dream and leave no tragic stress 
Of mortal pain to mar it, but the mood 

Serene of Art's eternal attitude, 
Its marble equipoise, the passionless ! 
Restrain the line that trembles on excess. 

And let no vital groove of grief intrude ; 

Accord each contour thy solicitude. 
Bid all the curves of beauty coalesce. 
High dreams, that dare the absolute, repose 

In plastic peace ! Angelo's Day and Night 

Limned, dawn and dusk, with faint Etruscan rose; 
That temple's Phidian frieze, where troops the bright 
Pageant of Hellas' glory ; and that dream 

Of thy own soul, seeking the clue supreme. 



THE HUSHED GODS 

LORN are the ways from old illusion won, 
A sense of loss through all the woodland floats ; 

No sylvan now in myrtle thicket dotes, 
For any timid oread to shun ; 
Here tells no tousled glade of satyr fun. 

Nor winding path where fauns crossed waving oats ; 

No distant piping of delirious notes, 
No vine-strewed tracks of Bacchic revel, none! 
Where are the satyrs dear to genial Pan, 

The oreads that bathe in Dian's pool ? 

The jocund woodland horde, half goat, half man. 
The coy and fair of Daphne's coverts cool ? 
Of all who worshipped once and once believed, 

Glows no Hellenic heart yet undeceived ? 



TANAGRA 

" Give back the ttpward looking and the light " 

OUT of Tanagra's old necropolis, 
And from the grudging clutch of time, the joy 

Of Hellas, in this shepherd girl and boy, 
Laughs lightward from oblivion's abyss ; 
Supine, with limbs and lips that twine and kiss, 

Caresses that uncleaving never cloy. 

The youth of earth is rife in these uncoy 
Figures of terra-cotta, born to bliss. 
Earth-loving and intuitive, the Greek 

Learned, long ago, the wisdom that we seek ; 

Weary of worship for the noumenon, 
We turn from Calvary to Helicon ; 
From subtle introspection to the free 

And soul-uncaring life of Arcady. 



M 



AQU^ RELIGIO 

Y soul revolts at that ascetic Sign, 

The Cross whose pity stifled Pagan glee; 

A strain of pride, imperial in me, 
Acclaims an alien heritage as mine. 
I would, in purple of the Palatine, 

The body's apotheosis decree; 

The pristine creed of carnal purity. 
Whose only fane is plastic beauty's shrine. 
Oh, I would be, at Diocletian's Baths, 

An athlete, clean of body, sure of soul ; 

Emerging from the stadium to stroll. 
Symmetrical of limb, the shaded paths ; 
And watch the sun a deeper bronze emboss 

The torso of Apoxyomenos. 



VESPASIAN'S CIRCUS 

VAST canopies across its crater bloat, 
Whose shadows splash the sand with purple light ; 
The tiered arena s waving girth of white 
Vents roar on roar, as from one bellowing throat ; 
Cresting the din, cries of the jungle float, 

Mad howl of rage and scream of ferine fright; 
Turmoil and dust, and beasts in mangled might, 
While over all the grave Augustans gloat. 
Under their jutted bastion, tumult-tamed. 
The embers of the combat in his eye. 
Licking his bloody jaws, a wild dog slinks; 
And where the Caesar's flambeaus flare, a maimed 
Mammoth in frenzy sweeps his trunk on high 
And hurls against the wall a writhing lynx. 



AN OLD COIN 

ROME'S tyrant may have spun thee, coin of yore, 
And on thy fall a lesser empire lost; 
Perchance Poppea fingered, Lucan tossed 
Thee to a dancer ; or, in search of lore, 
Petronius paid thee for a scroll that bore 

Some ode from Mitylene. Thou hast crossed 
The Stygian stream, an obol for the mossed 
Hand of old Charon, fare for Hades' shore. 
Now dull, decipherless, and green with blight. 
Tombed in a musty tray, the passing heed 
Alone of some devout numismatist; 
Worthless to banish pain, to buy delight, 
Such fate is thine, outlingering Pagan greed, 
Dead barter of dead millions dust-abyssed. 



THE LATIN SEA 

THE wonder of its blue is under us; 
We see, with glamor of Homeric lore, 
Shimmer the wave that lured Ulysses' oar 

And Jason faring for the fabulous. 

Yon trellised slopes were thine, Theocritus ! 

And those trim galleys, bound for Capri's shore, 
Dart from the cove and follow, as of yore. 

The burnished trireme of Tiberius. 

Hellas and Rome, templed antiquity. 

Looming along thy shore, O Latin sea, 

Live once again beneath the dreaming glance; 

Around thee clings the virgin world's romance; 

And there, beyond the Pillars of Hercules, 
Glimmers the Isle of the Hesperides. 



8 



HADRIAN'S VILLA 

GREEN lizards glide along the grass where erst 
Acanthus-carved and rose-entwined, the three 

Pergolas gleamed in rival harmony; — 
Vista of marble gods forsaken first 
For adolescence that Bithynia nursed ; 

The curled cup-bearer of his dream that he 

Later invested with divinity, 
Grieving for that fair boy the Nile immersed. 
Art's regal devotee, he strove to sate 

His soul, ravished with Hellas, to the core; 

Cities of gold from dust to recreate 
Dazzled his ardor, avid to adore 
Temple and statue ; and, half amorous, 

Even the beauty of Antinoiis. 



HELIOGABALUS 

THE Fates that hold, imperial Androgyne, 
Even the doom of those immortal, made 

The girlish flush suffuse thy cheek and laid 
Upon thy pouting lips the drench of wine ! 
Above thy brow they massed the festucine 

Tresses and bound them with a mitra's braid ; 

And in thy eyes, O Mime of sex, essayed 
To throne the glamor of the Erycine. 
Through all the years that were, the years to be, 

Insoluble the riddle epicene ; 

Nature must falter or the deity 
When soul and sex but join to contravene. 
Answer and tell us from the realm of Dis, 

Heliogabalus and Semiramis ! 



lO 



CAIA'S STAR 

YON star is thine ! climbing the Roman skies, 
Above the Appian Way, as fair of light 

As when Caius and Caia knew the night; 
Yes, thine the storied star that lustrous lies 
And nestles low between the secret sighs 

Of Night's black bosom ; as a jewel might 

Cradled on some bare ebon breast, requite 
Its dove-warm* couch with diamonded surprise. 
Yon star is thine ! but nearer is a gem 

Of astral worth, half hidden from my gaze ; 

Under the scarf, as filmy as a haze, 
It lifts its balmy dual diadem ; 
My star ! your heart, whose wild pulsations claim 

Mine, burden sweet, as flame that flows on flame. 



II 



^GEAN IDYL 

HIGH on the summit of ^olic hills, 
Above the sweep of amethystine seas, 
White pillars print their slender symmetries 

Against a sky the green of twilight fills ; 

Up from the water comes a breeze that chills ; 
And near the verge, two nubile devotees, 
Vestals of Aphrodite's temple, ease 

Their hearts' restrained desire whose pathos thrills. 

Silent they stand, caressingly, and dream 

With eyes that tell, veiled in the vague and far, 
The immanence of immolating bliss ; 

Eager, with cheeks that pale, to catch the gleam, 

Faint on the sea, of Vesper's votive star. 
Herald of night and the creative kiss. 



12 



CORINTH 

MARBLE and gold, through all her amplitude 
Of temples that allure, the Isthmus queen 

And siren of the cities Lampsacene 
Burns in her beauty, insolent of mood; 
Wafting afar her musk and myrrh, and wooed 

Of all the fawning world, she basks serene; 

Desire, as incense, floats around her seen 
Upon her thoral throne, divinely nude. 
Corinth ! The word is memory to his ear ! 

He journeys back, the heart's anabasis; 

Turning the street, the temple steps are near- 
Run to thy lover, Anasyrtolis ! 
Tears for Adonis ? all thy roses sere ? 

Long didst thou wait, flower-girl of Argolis ! 



13 



ANADYOMENE 

(After the painting by Cabanel) 

LO, the ineffable form their dream extolled, 
When her white temples crowned the cliffs and drew 

Pale devotees whose hearts invoked the true 
Daughter of God that Sappho hymned of old ; 
Beauty whose vision, wrought serenely bold, 

With love's revering eyes they yearned to view ; 

The carnal grace whose sway their wisdom knew, 
The suaver line than their ephebic mold. 
And now, as ravished Greeks, our eyes behold 

Her limbs cleave curving to their natal blue; 

Her hair, whose every tress the sea-winds woo, 
Flow free along the foam in lustrous gold; 
While conscious of the life that thrills her through, 

Soft to adoring Loves her lids unfold. 



14 



ANAKTORIA 

O GOLDEN girl, beloved of Sappho, met 
In many a dream made fervid with her face, 

^olic Song has wreathed around a vase, 
Votive to love and thee, its long regret ; 
Hearts still upon a secret altar set 

This rifted amphor whose inverted grace 

Shall waft for two, through the dim chamber's space, 
Strange odor of a Pagan cassolet. 
To Sappho's lips thy beauty was a lyre 

Leaping to virgin music under mad 

Kisses that seared as sacrificial fire; 
Ritual defloration, sweet and sad ; 
The rapture of its ravage and the glad 

Relaxing languor of assuaged desire. 



15 



EUXANTHIS 

THE wooded vales are drowsy with the heat; 
Under the ilex' shade a satyr sleeps ; 

The myrtle moves ! Pan from the coppice peeps, 
And flutes a note to Syrinx, melic sweet. 
Far in the forest's heart the branches meet 

Above the dryad's pool ; their shadow keeps. 

Turning to green the water's limpid deeps, 
A lucent gloom to lure the sylvan feet. 
Long stems and leaves of lilies aquatile 

Litter the edge and float upon the pool ; 

Broken by whim of white Euxanthis while, 
Thigh-deep among their clusters, splashing cool ; 
Nymph of the supple loins, who rests to snare 

A dripping garland in her orange hair. 



i6 



THE FLAMING HEART 

''Byron stood on the shore and beheld a flame of marvelous 
beauty rise heavenward from the dead poefs heart " 

ARE those ridge-forests groves of Ilian fir 
Adown whose moaning tops the night winds run ? 

Is that immobile watcher Thetis' son, 
That burning fragrance cinerary myrrh ? 
Do large libations to the gods aver, 

Poured round that pyre, the vanquished Myrmidon; 

Or sleeps some weary child of Helicon, 
Old organ-throated sea his thurifer? 
Diviner he, than lorn Achilles lost 

In grief and shadow on the waveward sand, 

Who sees the flame, by the mad mistral fanned. 
Feed on the heart the restful hand had crossed ; 
And glutted to the full of its desire. 

Thrill golden with the dead companion fire. 



17 



A BURIAL URN 

LONG since he carved thee revel-wreathed that thou 
Mightst laugh at Thanatos with flute and flower; 

And toy with destiny until the hour 
It gave the dust thy heart is keeping now ; 
Fond dust that erst was warm from foot to brow ; 

Rescued from dissolution and the worm 

To claim from thee, after a cycle's term, 
An ultimate and meet sepulchral vow. 
Less cherished wert thou, shape symmetrical. 

For all thy circling joy of nymphs and these 

Consoling verses of Phocylides — 
Yea, the white virtue of such burial ! 
Ditfnot the treasure of her ashes rest, 

A mournful secret, in thy marble breast. 



i8 



THE RACE 

EVER I follow where the vision fled; 
Match stride with stride, virile and swift as when 

After the fleet white-limbed lonienne, 
Hippomenes, straining each muscle, sped; 
Ever the glimmer of her feet ahead ; 

Ever the flying garment, as a mist 

Floating around her, trailed by knee and wrist ; 
Ever the grace, revealed and coveted. 
Not thine, O Love, the race ! nor thine to fling 

Unseen the golden apple of delay; 

No artifice can any goddess bring 
To crown me victor, at the goal, to-day; — 
Endless the race the tireless runners make ! 

Lost Self that Self may never overtake. 



19 



A GREEK FRIEZE 

AS figures, on a frieze processional, 
In marble march across the metope 

Of some old temple to eternity 
Go golden-stained of time's smooth kiss, so all 
Those loves that carved for life its coronal 

File slow across the flame of dreams for me ; 

And I, as senile Casanova, see 
Each profile flower and fade, and shadow fall. 
They pass with gaze oblivious of mine 

That singles those undying passion knew; 

She, tigress-orbed, whose sin was blight malign 
To youth's high thought ; and she, once regnant through 
Her lips' red luxury ; and she, who drew 

My soul to her with song as to a shrine. 



20 



MELEAGER 

TWINE me a garland, such as Diodes 
Once welcomed from thy hand, O Gadarene! 

Whose leaves of laurel intertwine their green 
With flowers that symbol Song's divinities. 
Erinna's crocus, sweet to Attic bees. 

Nearest to Sappho's glowing rose should lean ; 

And lilies of Anyte bloom between 
The golden wheat-sprays of Bacchylides. 
But rather would I breathe the lover's flowers 

Culled languid at the tryst in dreaming hours ; 

The wreath of dill for Heliodora's hair. 
Or reddest rose for Demo's bosom bare ; 
Or a fresh nosegay for Zenophila 

From the sea-garden of thy Syria. 



21 



A TEAR BOTTLE 

O SLENDER bauble, where her grief was told! 
Long emptied of the drops that slowly slid 

Through the clasped fingers, o'er the languid lid, 
To fill thy frigid heart and grow as cold ; 
What ruthless hand with sacrilege was bold 

To pillage thus her burial pyramid ; 

And thee unseal, her sorrow's slave, and bid 
Thy crystal shrine yield up its tribute gold ? 
Some grief memorial thou mightst avow ! 

Were thine the tears the girl for Caesar shed ? 

Or when, in dire alarm, the sails were spread 
And turned from Antony her galley's prow ? 
Or were they love's last pledge to him when brow 

And bust were prone, and Egypt's siren dead ? 



22 



THE FLAGELLANT 

UNDER her lashes lurk the flames that flash 
Sorcerous glamor of the basilisk ; 

Her heavy hair, wound in a tawny disk, 
Unloosens as their brooding glances clash; — 
Race, creed and clime are waived for fancies rash ; 

He lolls a sultan, while with silken whisk 

Her robes fall free, and she, an odalisque, 
Shrinks nude before him, fearful of the lash. 
And she, of regal mien, must ever be 

The sobbing prey of this perverted dream ; 

And he, supine to base obsession, see 
Her tears a spur, the cruel whip supreme; 
And the red welt across her shoulders gleam 

Where his long kiss knew no satiety. 



23 



A JEWESS 

THE Bible sirens wield their wanton spell 
And peer, derisive rebels, from her face; 

Though vestal eyes rebuke these specters base. 
Their lure imbrues her lips of rodomel. 
Assyrian of soul, she scorns to quell 

Each mocking wraith that fleers a moment's space; 

The lids droop languid with Delilah's grace, 
Around the mouth the wiles of Myrrha dwell. 
Erewhile a rhythmic tremor seems to pass 

From throat to heel, and by the thrill betrayed 

She takes the dancer's posture to persuade; 
The satin glints, as girdle and cuirass. 
And veils the nympholeptic throe that swayed 

The supple daughter of Herodias. 



24 



THE MUEZZIN 

BELOW the walls of Bagdad sinks the sun! 
Long glows strike red the ways that dusk concealed, 

Like flame reflected from a brazen shield ; 
In purple adumbration loom as one 
The cedared slopes that fading splendors shun. 

Far date-palms rise in burnished bloom revealed; 

The camels shamble khanward cushion-heeled, 
Laden with spice from distant Koordistun. 
Sundown and prayer hour in the town antique ! 

And toward the caliph's mosque, what chanting sound? 

"Allah il Allah ! " fall the accents meek, 
A petal-drift of prayer that sinks around. 
My eyes the minareted dervish seek 

As turbaned foreheads near me touch the ground. 



25 



THE GHEBER 

IN necromantic mood I wheel my seat 
To face the cannel glowing in the grate ; 
I stir the coals to read what message fate, 

In flames I free from bondage, may secrete; 

Fire-sibyls leap and writhe and vanish fleet, 
Beckon the devotee with smile elate, 
Or flash upon the wall their shadowy hate ; 

While I, content to let illusion cheat. 

Half sunk in slumber, dimly note a change; 

The room expands, dark slaves are at the door. 
The sacred flames forsake their humbler range 

And, throned on brazen altars, scorn the floor ; 

And turbaned, bearded, garbed in vesture strange, 
I salaam to the fire-god and adore. 



26 



A VENETIAN WINE GLASS 

A SHIFTING curve of iris color e'er 
Irradiates it, niched in shadow grim ; 

With graceful shape that tapers amphor-trim 
It foils the dusk and shimmers debonair; 
Once chattel of some Tuscan palace where, 

Against the random sunray amber dim, 

Colonna's vintage sparkling to its brim 
Warmed passionate breasts to banquet mirth laid bare. 
Around its rim might lurk a secret sere. 

Ghost of a golden voice that mocked and laughed ; 

" From this fair cup my tragic story hear ; 
With youth's red lips, ere yet the wiser quaffed, 
I drank to him and knew, too late to fear, 

The Borgia mixed for me the poison draught." 



27 



AT RIMINI 

SOME soul of fire, that scorched the ashen past, 
Again incarnate ! Egypt ? Nay, not she ; 
Nor Dido, nor that high divinity 

Of Song that Lesbos knew. A pride less vast 

Cinctured this heart's impulsive strength that cast 
Law off for love ; a fate than theirs less free 
Of scope for love's untamed intensity, 

And tragic power to whelm the world aghast. 

Fettered to flesh once more, Francesca's soul 
In this Italian flower-girl's lowly lot, 
Black-orbed and unabashed, of death's red goal 

And love's resistless sway remembers not. 

This is the garden of their guilt, the spot 

Where to the fatal tryst they trembling stole. 



28 



M 



A SPIDER 

Y bust of Byron and a nude antique, 
United never in my idlest thought, 

His predal skill a Cupid-net has wrought. 
Plighting the poet to the sculptured Greek. 
Astride his snare that glistens satin-sleek, 

Intently wary for the witless gnat. 

Alert to strike, and crafty as a cat. 
He checks the flight of many a winging freak. 
O boyhood's fiery bard ! thy lordly brow 

This vandal has profaned ; and all thy pride, 

Once swiftest to resent, is passive now; 
And the white nymph of Hellas, at thy side. 
Is docile, too ; and he, the jester base 

Of Art and Song, binds her in thy embrace. 



29 



LAFCADIO HEARN 

''Peace to thee, Lafcadio, child of ErUi and Hellas'' 

ETERNAL peace, Lafcadio, be thine! 
Rest well in that far land of old Japan ; 

O indefatigable artisan, 
Poet whose vision verged on the divine ! 
No more beneath the shoji eglantine 

Shalt thou discern the moon on Fuji San ; 

Or hearken, only as a lover can, 
The patter of her Nippon chioppine. 
Blessing thy tomb the stone Bosatsu sits, 

Symbol of resignation, and at dusk 

Around the dreaming god the firefly flits ; 
And from the temple, through the drifting musk 
Of cherry blooms, the bonze's bell that tolls 

Calls thee from Kamo, over the River of Souls. 



30 



EPHEMERA 

THY feral fancy, morbid for the nonce, 
Roving the past on retrospection s wings. 
Strives vainly to defer the doom of things 

Like a spent candle waning in the sconce. 

An insect, creeping up the nymph that vaunts 
The bronze abandon of her beauty, brings 
Alone to thought, while disillusion clings. 

Abortive lives whose viscid envy haunts. 

They trailed on thee, though spurned, their little slime. 
As the vile worm across an exquisite 
Marble of Hellas, mellow-tinged of time ; 

Unmarked in Art's immeasurable light, 

The myriad ignoble that have gone 

As dust brushed downward to oblivion. 



31 



CREPUSCULINE 

IDYLLIC fair in some secluded seat, 
Some ingle-nook of half translucent gloom, 
With restful thoughts like flowers of faint perfume 

Heart-sensed in pensive introspection sweet; 

So one would dream to find you — dream complete — 
Musing at dusk in some myth-haunted room. 
Where gracious ghosts at fancy's mandate loom 

To lay the gifts of genius at your feet. 

Loved books should be about you — silence reign; 
A rose as white in hands that interlace, 
With music breathing art a spirit strain ; 

Then some companion soul to pause apace, 

Entranced as Tasso when Ferrara's vain 

Divine perfection touched him with its grace. 



32 



A HAUNTED ROOM 

HERE was love's parting; that regretful hour 
Passed into memory here — naught, naught is new; 
Still slanting light athwart a vase of blue 
A gladiolus lifts its scarlet flower. 
There is the memoried nook, the mimic tower 
Of cherished books, the window seat for two ; 
And there, as in the days I deemed her true. 
The mantel group of shapes Medusan glower. 
The place is sentient of her — everything — 
Each object that her beauty loveless left 
When from the room, still sobbing low, she passed ; 
There on the threshold yet, half lingering, 
I see her pause, as one of hope bereft, 

Who still delays the look she knows the last. 



33 



FAME 

DIVINE as some forgiving fate she stands, 
Whose purpose baffled, tragic godship waived, 
Suffers the hope that held her heart enslaved 
To steal the waiting vengeance from her hands; 
While, long marooned, from memory's arid strands 
Drifts to her eyes in tears the old appeal; 
Her lips, reclaiming pity's trembling seal, 
Proffer the kiss of pardon love commands. 
What art could add to nature's gift, was hers 
The master sway where all emotion lies. 
In depth of tenderness no words may name; 
Though aspiration's virgin whisper spurs. 
And, beckoning her, down fancy's vista flies 
Atalanta-like the shining shape of Fame. 



34 



A SOAP BUBBLE 

SLOWLY it moves away, a sphere of dew 
Whose vibrant motion in the lucent air 

Denies perfection to its contour fair; 
And where no evanescent tints renew 
Their opal streaks, it takes a sapphire hue; 

Soon will the fitful breeze its poise impair 

And wafting it to some ethereal lair, 
My eyes shall lose it in the upper blue. 
But should the breeze be blithe and over-bold 

Its breath will pierce and break the shining sphere; 

Alas, such is its destiny, to veer 
Swiftly and burst! — O bubble-theme of gold ! 
My dream, whose frailer splendor must expire 

Even as this, and fold its wings of fire. 



35 



ADOLESCENCE 

LET the Muse lead thee as a trusting child 
To Hippocrene, upon the sacred mountain ; 
Eager to drink, prone at the limpid fountain, 

With thirsting lips the water undefiled ; 

And thou wilt drown thy grieving in the wild 

Sea's vaster woe ; or from the lark's dominion, 
Win lyric strength to leap on upward pinion 

And revel in the blue ; or dream-beguiled 

Down ways of tangled hedge and arching vines, 
Refingering the reed of Arcady, 
Shut from thyself the dolorous lot of man ; 

Hearing, enamored still, the voice of Pan 

In the insistent sighing of the pines 
And the remoter music of the sea. 



36 



MENDELSSOHN'S SPRING SONG 

LIKE lark-elated notes that drift and dream 
Across a dawn of gold, its lyric stress 

Of music's unimagined tenderness 
Stirs the heart's void to rapture. Still supreme, 
Love sweeps forgotten chords that swiftly glide 

To old remembrance ; vanished fervors glow ; 

And the dead sorrows tremble up but go 
No deeper now than painless tears abide. 
O bird-blithe voice, ecstatic utterance ! 

Lost in the radiant blue of cherished things 

Our thoughts catch flame and, with a flash of wings. 
Reclaim the olden visions that entrance ; 
Skies break in blue above the somber day, 

The woods of youth wave green against the grey. 



37 



PRINTEMPS NOCTURNE 

TALL lances of the poplars guard the Seine, 
Whose curves, eccentric silver, wind away ; 

And where their distant gleam grows dim with day 
The vesper glow has faded to a stain. 
The lilac clusters at the window wane 

To vaguer purple, blending spray and spray; 

And breathe the heart with odor, as they sway, 
A morbid sense of some forgotten pain. 
The rainy gust, along the vernal night, 

Bending the poplars in a single line 

As tall ascetics at a sacred rite. 
Surges across the lilacs that repine ; 
The drooping clusters part their blooms and swing 

Like scented censers at the shrine of Spring. 



38 



THE TWILIGHT POOL 

A FURTIVE shadow from the nearer trees 
Troubles the water with a grey regard ; 

All day its placid mood was left unmarred 
Nor ruffled with the breath of any breeze; 
A magic mirror, sensitive to seize 

Skies that the crimson spears of dawn had scarred ; 

And now, ere somber gates of dusk are barred. 
The silver vesper's paler pageantries. 
The shade that lengthens from the leaning pine 

Across its surface sends a sudden chill ; 

Stray tremors, at the edge, in red define 
The sinking chalice on the distant hill ; 
Whence the last glory of the sun will spill 

Over its fluid heart the flush of wine. 



39 



ADAGIO LAMENTOSO 

MY soul was shaken with orchestral grief ! 
Defiant cry of pain Promethean 
Through the vast clash of winds and brasses ran 

With surge crescendo; slowly from belief 

In triumph to despair, between the brief 
Moan of the violins, all tones began 
To sink and languish ; ending fainter than 

The flute-note falling softer than a leaf. 

Then almost silence ! from a shred of sound 

The flute's wail rose, and with a throb subdued 
The violins took up the low refrain ; 

And like a voice, calling from depths profound, 

Eerie and far, despair's incertitude, 

Floated the sigh of that harmonic pain. 



40 



VALOR 

NOT now, my soul, must thou turn craven thing. 
And cede thy conquered lands as death's domain ! 

Are life's grim fields of battle void of gain 
And the old reckless ardor wavering ? 
No fear to thee should any menace bring ; 

The world's grey lies fell foiled from thy disdain. 

Its blades of hate have met thy steel in vain; 
An epinikion is thine to sing ! 
What ! like a boy to blanch with battle fear 

Nor chafe the hours that lag before the fray ? 

I scorn the thought as Spartan would the sin. 
My blood mounts bold as creeps the conflict near, 
And lone upon that last Thermopylae, 

I wait the combat none may hope to win. 



41 



THE PAGAN END 

BE mine thy final boon, O furnace bed ! 
Where the consuming element may make, 

Rather than slow decay, my dust forsake 
The form that life has left untenanted ; 
Be mine the fairer Pagan end when dead. 

Soon as the purifying flame may slake 

Its zealot thirst upon my body, take 
That dust, then dreamless all, where oft I led 
Your feet along the cliffs whose frowning wall 

Holds at its barrier base the beating waves ; 

There cast my ashes, dear, for I would be 
A part of that we loved to hear and see ; 
Then day and night my voice may seem to call 

Soft with the sea's, or madly when it raves. 



42 



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